Conman fleeced cancer patient

A confidence trickster of “brutal” proportions preyed repeatedly on a cancer sufferer, robbing her of all her money.

Ian Standing, 47, befriended 53-year-old Emmer Green woman Rachel Goode after they met in a pub and began to approach her for cash.

Inheritance from the loss of her parents and an insurance payout after being diagnosed with breast cancer was siphoned off by Standing, who even pretended he had cancer to defraud her of at least £300,000.

He also lived it up at the Madejski Millennium Hotel in South Reading, having paid a bill of £24,000 and still owed a further £6,000, all funded by Miss Goode, when police caught up with him.

Recorder Rhona Campbell sentenced Standing to three years and 10 months in jail at Reading Crown Court on Friday.

He admitted the fraud charge on the basis of £300,000 although Miss Goode’s calculation was that it was more like £412,000.

The court heard the offences took place between July 2009 to November 2011, when Standing and she were platonic friends who regularly drank with their respective partners in The Lamb, the location of which was not specified in court.

Standing had told her he had been successful in business – marketing and artwork – but after losing his job in America he began to ask Miss Goode to lend him money.

Graham Smith, prosecuting, said Miss Goode’s father died in 2008 and she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2009. She received critical illness insurance of £130,000 in 2009 and in 2010 her mother died and she inherited £240,000. She lost her job because of the cancer diagnosis and was suffering severe depression.

Mr Smith said she was a “very vulnerable person” at the time when Standing began to approach her for money.

On the first occasion, Standing showed her his bank statement, which purported to contain £1.4 million, asking her for a loan to pay a tax bill.

He asked her to lend him money, making up a series of false scenarios involving customs and excise, his accountant, his solicitor, his solicitor’s wife and his godmother.

He showed her emails purporting to come from those people – real people but fake emails – to convince her to lend him the money.

He even claimed he had been diagnosed with cancer and needed money for his treatment.

Standing also admitted a separate charge of fraud in which he “borrowed” Miss Goode’s Mercedes car worth £23,000 – and all the paperwork – telling her he needed it as temporary security for a bank debt, then sold it for £10,700 and pocketed the cash.

It was when he failed to return with the car and Miss Goode was unable to contact him that she called police and Standing was found living – with his then girlfriend – in the Madejski Millennium Hotel.

The court heard she had intended to sell the car herself because she was now so short of money and that she had been forced to sell her own home and “downsize” because of the way Standing had fleeced her.

Defence claims he was a real friend – who had a bad childhood and autism

Andrew Storch , defending Standing, said psychiatric reports revealed a childhood stammer which led to bullying had had a significant effect on him.

The report said he had “autistic traits”. When he said Standing, between 1995 and 2002, held a successful and highly paid job earning £150,000 a year, Mr Storch was asked by the Recorder what evidence he had of that.

As there was none, she said given the other evidence in the case, those claims should be treated with “a healthy scepticism”.

Mr Storch said Standing was proposing to set up his own business and he still believed it was a business model which could be successful.

His marriage also ended and as a result Mr Storch said he got into “financial difficulties”.

He refuted the suggestion that Miss Goode had been targeted for her money all along, saying Standing had been her friend and given her support before she had any money at all.

Mr Storch said Standing did “accept in the early days he Defence claims he was a real friend – who had a bad childhood and autism started to tell half truths which later became complete untruths”.

As an example he said Standing was tested for symptoms of testicular cancer then given the all clear.

The Recorder pointed out Standing then sent an email to Miss Goode in 2011 claiming to have “tumours in his upper spine, prostate and bowel”.

Miss Campbell said Standing preyed on Miss Goode when she was “emotionally raw”.

She said his claim to have cancer when Miss Goode was really suffering from the disease was “moral depravity”.

She told Standing: “As soon as you were aware that she was a fruitful source of cash with which you could live the lifestyle that you wanted, you most certainly did target her ruthlessly again and again and again.”

She sentenced Standing to three years and 10 months for the confidence fraud on Miss Goode amounting to £300,000 and four months concurrent for the separate fraud involving the Mercedes.

A provisional date for a confiscation hearing to try to get some of the money back is set for February 22, 2013.